


Chemistry Class

by gaifieri



Category: Naruto
Genre: BECAUSE THERE AREN'T ENOUGH OF THOSE ALREADY, High School AU, M/M, soccer player and motivational speaker lee, transfer student gaara
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-18
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 21:47:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1485226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaifieri/pseuds/gaifieri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>High school AU about transfer student Gaara having to deal with a doofus for a lab partner aka Rock Lee.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chemistry Class

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this forever ago and HAVE YET TO FINISH PART 2. i'm posting it here in hopes that it will....motivate me...i guess...to write the rest of it...ok bye

Gaara sat with his arms folded across the desk, glaring at the older boy sitting beside him and wondering why he always seemed to have the worst luck.

The classroom was buzzing with students who had just been paired off, getting to know one another and beginning their assignments. Most of the students were on friendly terms, or at least knew each others' names. For Gaara, there wasn't a familiar face in the room. But there was a rather large and overbearing one staring at him, closer than he generally allowed people to be.

"So, it looks like we are partners!" The classmate sitting to his right was grinning at him, wide-eyed and holding his thumb high in the air. "My name is Rock, Lee; please call me Lee. I look forward to facing this challenge known as _chemistry_ with you. I hope that we bond strongly over the hardships that will surely confront us this year!"

Too enthusiastic, Gaara thought; much too enthusiastic.

He continued to examine his partner through narrow eyes. Even though he was sitting, Gaara could tell he was tall, and he could tell that beneath the school uniform he wore, he was fairly muscular. His black hair was just long enough to cover his ears and the nape of his neck; his fringe was just long enough to partially hide his eyebrows, but it would take a lot more than bangs, no matter how thick, to cover those overwhelming eyebrows.

His gaze returned to his classmate’s eyes. Lee stared back, his grin unwavering, thumb still held obnoxiously high. Gaara sighed, turning his head to look away from Lee.

"You're not in my year, are you?" He asked.

"Ah, well, um," Lee was stumbling over his words, his grin had gone and his hand was now scratching at the back of his head. "No, actually, I am in the year above you..."

"This is a second year class."

"That it is -- "

Gaara's eyes returned to Lee, strained with annoyance and boring into his classmate's cheek as he spoke. "I take it you're no good at chemistry, then?"

Lee gripped his fist tightly, smacking it against the table they shared. His eyes were shining as he spoke. "You are right to assume that chemistry is not my strong suit. In fact, this is the second time I have taken this class. Although I may not be skilled in science, or mathematics, for that matter, I am a very accomplished athlete! I have a great deal of respect from my comrades on the soccer field because. In fact, Coach Gai says I am his best pupil! Coach Gai also says -- "

"Unless Coach Gai is tutoring you in chemistry, I don't care what he says," Gaara said, cutting Lee off. He sat up straight, pulling the paper describing their first assignment towards him. "I won't forgive you if you make me fail this class."

"I would never!" Lee pressed his palm against his chest. "If I were to bring a fellow classmate down because of my ineptitude, well, that would be worse than failing the class myself."

Lee continued speaking as Gaara read over the assignment. Slipping a hand into his left pocket, he pressed his fingers against the token he kept there. In times of stress, simply grazing his fingers against the small item was enough to ease his nerves, if only a little.

Still rambling on, Lee seemed unaware that Gaara wasn't listening. Gaara was focusing on the assignment. He heard Lee ask for his name, and when that question was left unanswered, he moved onto the next; a constant flow of unanswered questions followed by enthusiastic statements as Gaara arranged their equipment in front of them. Lee finished with an extravagant hand gesture, and Gaara tuned back in as he finished arranging their equipment.

" -- that I will work my very hardest not to fail you, for I believe that even if one is not a natural-born genius, with enough perseverance, one can accomplish anything! All I need to do is try my hardest; I believe that is what Coach Gai would say if he was here now."

There was a beat of silence and Gaara blinked in surprise as he realized that meant Lee was done speaking. His classmate seemed unaffected by the fact that Gaara had missed most of his speech and ignored whatever he had said before that. Was he unaware that Gaara had been ignoring him, or did he just not care?

Either answer was equally annoying.

"You're very passionate," Gaara commented.

Lee smiled widely. "It is one of my best qualities, among many others."

"And conceited," Gaara added.

"Confident," Lee corrected, "as any young student in the springtime of their youth should be."

Gaara raised one eyebrow to his classmate before giving his full attention back to the assignment in front of him. "Let me do all the work. If you're no good at this, then I don't want you botching our assignments."

"But, as partners, shouldn't our workload be equal?"

"You'll undoubtedly mess something up," Gaara said, "and I refuse to get anything other than top marks."

There was another beat of silence before Lee nodded his head solemnly. "I understand. I will do my part by cheering you on from the sidelines. I believe in you, lab partner!"

Gaara squinted hard, trying to asses his lab partner's levels of sincerity (and sanity). After several seconds of sharing a rather intense glare, he moved his gaze away from his classmate's and began the assignment. Lee sat bent over the table in anticipation, keeping his word as he whispered words of encouragement to his lab partner every few seconds.

Gaara had hoped he would receive a partner with a much quieter form of participation, but at least this way he could do things how he wanted.

\---

Their arrangement lasted a little over a week, and it had worked quite well, in Gaara's opinion. Although aggravating at times, Lee's mini-speeches about Giving Their All and Defeating the Odds through Hard Work and Perseverance were easy enough to tune out, as well as his whispered words of encouragement doled out as Gaara executed their assignments. But their scheme was foiled when Iruka, their chemistry teacher, pointed out how little of the work Lee seemed to be doing. After that, he made a point of checking on their progress a few times every class period, and Gaara had had to entrust Lee with portions of their assignments to appease their teacher.

Gaara mulled over their new arrangement as he watched the clouds pass above him. He was laying on the rooftop of the athletics building, in the same spot he always spent his lunches, free periods, and occasionally an hour or so after school. Laying back against the rough surface of the rooftop, he stretched his arms back behind his head, chewing his lip thoughtfully. Although grueling, it would be manageable for now. Lee hadn't set fire to their classroom (yet), but he hadn't done the assignment as well as Gaara could have, either. But a few weeks of Lee's poor work wouldn't be too hard to make up for in the future, as long as it was only a few weeks. Iruka would surely be off their backs by then, and they could resume their prior arrangement.

He rolled onto his side, closing his eyes and fitting his palm beneath his cheek. Now that that was settled, maybe he could get a few minutes of sleep. Skipping his next class was always an option, it's not like anyone would miss him in PE anyway...

Just as he began to slip unconscious, loud voices from the courtyard below jolted him awake.

"Hey, Dork Lee, I'm talking to you. Or don't you have ears under that lame haircut of yours?"

"Of course I have ears, and they are fully-functioning, thank you. You are behaving rudely, so I chose to ignore you."

The second voice was familiar to Gaara. It was unmistakable who it belonged to.

Gaara crawled forward, staying low to ensure he didn't draw attention to himself. When he leaned over the parapet, he was not surprised to find his lab partner in the courtyard below. Three students from Gaara's year surrounded him; he didn't recall ever learning their names, but he could tell by looking at them that they weren't people he wanted to cross paths with. He had in fact changed his path, several times since arriving at this school, in order to avoid them.

The tallest boy, the one with jet black hair, placed a hand on Lee's shoulder, pushing him back roughly. "You think I'm being rude? What a shame, I thought we could be friends."

"I apologize," Lee said, "but I would never be friends with the likes of you."

"Why's that?" The red-haired girl had spoken up, wrapping an arm around Lee's shoulder as she pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

"You are simply not worth my time," Lee answered.

Gaara saw the black-haired boy's face twist into something he immediately recognized and turned away, his hand already clinging at the token he kept in his pocket. He pulled out the worn ziploc bag, opening it and digging two fingers into the cool sand he kept inside. He swirled his fingers through the bag, closing his eyes and forcing his breathing to calm down. _That idiot_ , he thought, putting the sand back into his pocket.

_Better him than me._

He crawled forward, towards the far side of the roof and away from the growing noises coming from below.

\---

In class the next day, Gaara felt as if there was a weight in the pit of his stomach. It wasn't an unfamiliar sensation to him, so it was easy to ignore. But the feeling seemed to be linked to something nagging at the corner of his mind.

"Gaara? Am I doing it right?" Lee asked, peering over the vial he held in his hand to catch his partner's eye.

Gaara gave a curt nod. "Make sure to combine them slowly."

Lee did as he was told, watching the chemicals with an intense gaze as he poured one into another. Gaara was checking over his profile every so often, looking for signs of the fight from yesterday. There were no marks on Lee's skin, no cuts or bruises that Gaara could see. He narrowed his eyes as he caught sight of a dark patch on Lee's jaw. He glared at it intently until he realized it was only a patch of dirt, probably from some training exercise or another. Lee seemed to be very enthusiastic about training, before and after school.

"Gaara -- um, I am following the directions accordingly, correct?"

Gaara nodded. "You're doing well enough." Not to my standards, Gaara added in his mind, but well enough to get a passing grade.

"Mmm," Lee hummed as he set the vial down atop the burner and turned towards his classmate "Right. Gaara, I very much appreciate the trust you have given me in allowing me to do today's assignment with my own two hands, but this has to stop. I cannot concentrate under such a scrutinizing gaze!"

Gaara's eyes widened in surprise. "You -- what?"

"I can feel your eyes boring into me, analyzing my every move, waiting for me to make a mistake! I am guaranteed to do so when you look at me that way."

Gaara frowned under Lee's gaze. Analyzing...? Well, what he was doing could be considered analyzing. But it wasn't because he was expecting Lee to make a mistake -- that was a given, no matter how closely Gaara watched him.

Gaara turned away from Lee, resting his head in his arms against the desk. "I'll stop looking then. Go on."

He heard Lee moving, then making his own noise of annoyance. As if he had anything to be annoyed about. Gaara was only curious as to how Lee had managed to survive yesterday's encounter without a scratch.

"Did I do something wrong?" Lee asked, cutting through Gaara's thoughts.

"I already told you, you are executing the assignment adequately."

"Are you annoyed that you no longer have full control over these experiments? Because if that is the case, please do not take your anger out on me. It was not my intention to lower your grade. I am simply trying to get a full education."

Lee kept speaking, but Gaara was an expert at tuning him out by now, and Lee had learned not to expect a reply from Gaara most of the time. But for once, he had something to say.

Gripping the ziploc bag tightly in one hand, he glanced at Lee through the corners of his eye. “You had a confrontation yesterday,” Gaara said. Lee stopped speaking mid-word, surprised by the fact that Gaara chose to respond for once. “I saw it from the rooftop.”

“Yes,” Lee answered. Gaara could sense a small wave of tension leave his classmate’s body as he spoke. “Uchiha and his followers confronted me during lunch yesterday. But do not worry; it won’t affect my work today.”

“I can see that.” Gaara turned to look out the window, watching the grass in the courtyard blow in the wind. “I don’t understand how you are seemingly unscathed. I saw Uchiha and two of his followers corner you.” _I saw the look on his face._ He clenched his sand a little more tightly, tracing the outlines of a few grains with his finger. “Did you manage to escape?”

Lee sighed, as deeply as if he had taken on some great hardship. Even though he wasn’t looking at his lab partner, Gaara could imagine the pose he was in. Right hand clutching his uniform over his heart, brow tightly knitted, eyes closed and his lips forming a tight frown.

“I would never run from a fight.”

“So you took them on by yourself? I don’t believe that.”

“Well, yes...and no.”

Gaara narrowed his eyes. “Explain.”

“It is simple.” Lee had returned to the assignment, picking the vial back up with one hand while he held the paper explaining their assignment in the other. “Uchiha came at me with his fists, but that was easy enough to block. I kicked him in the abdomen, he crouched forward from the pain, I elbowed him in the back, and he fell to the ground. His friends did not seem to like that. I think they were on the verge of trying to restrain me, but luckily, Coach Gai appeared! He gave me a good talking-to, of course, rebuking me for letting myself get carried away, and the other students scattered before he could speak to them.”

Gaara crossed his arms, annoyed at himself for wasting his breath. “So you don’t want to tell me what really happened. Fine.”

“That is the truth, Gaara!” In a fit of emotion, Lee’s hands waved back and forth, a few drops flying from the vial in his right hand. Gaara’s spine tensed and he gripped his elbows tightly.

“Be careful, Lee! Focus on the assignment.”

“I am!” Lee countered. Looking flustered with his eyebrows narrowed and a slight flush across his face as he stared intently at the paper in his hand. “Just...could you tell me what the next step is?”

“Didn’t you read the homework? This was covered in the chapter we were assigned.”

“Uh, well...”

“You didn’t do the homework.” It wasn’t a question, but the answer was written in guilt on Lee’s face.

“Ah...you see...”

“No wonder you’re so terrible at this. How do you expect to learn anything if you don’t do the assigned work?”

Lee waved his hands frantically again, chemical spilling out and flying onto the table. “I have told you before Gaara, I have absolutely no aptitude for this! Why bother working on something that I have no talent for? Nothing will come of it except for frustration!”

“Lee -- stop flailing. You can’t expect to progress at something if you never bother to practice -- watch out!”

Lee didn’t watch out. His eyes instead watched Gaara, lunging forward a moment too late. Some of the chemicals in the vial Lee held had splashed out into the burner, causing a relatively small and harmless flame to shoot up momentarily. The small flame should have been harmless, at least. If Lee hadn’t been holding the sheet of paper with their assignment detailed out over the burner, it would have been. But since the paper itself had been drenched with quite a bit of chemical and was hovering directly over the burner, it caught flame immediately.

Gaara had lunged forward too late to stop the fire, but he was just in time to be met with a face full of flames as they leapt forward and latched onto his brow.

Gaara threw himself back, swearing loudly enough to gain the attention of Iruka and every student in the room -- probably the students in the neighboring classes and the ones wandering the hallway too, he thought somewhere in the back of his mind.

What was at the forefront of his mind at the moment was the fact that his face was on fire.

As Lee swatted Gaara in the face with his fabric pencil case -- attempting to put out the flames in his own idiotic way, Gaara was sure -- Gaara cursed his luck.

He always had the worst luck.

\---

It was a good thing that appearance had never been especially important to Gaara. One should take care of oneself, that was a fundamental rule to surviving; but in regards to appearance, nothing more was necessary than basic hygiene. Bathing, keeping his hair a manageable length, and dressing appropriately enough to feel comfortable in the climate and not be arrested were his only real guidelines, when he thought long and hard about it.

But in all of the time he had spent contemplating the importance of his own appearance (that being a very small amount of time, admittedly) he had never once taken into account the importance of his eyebrows.

He stroked the skin above his eyes thoughtlessly; it had become an accepted habit over the last twenty-four hours. He watched the clouds pass by and furrowed his brow, groping at the space where his eyebrows once were. His fingers felt a slight change in texture and it stung a little as he touched it, but not horribly. The texture of his skin changed in the spots where the flames had only just touched his skin. He supposed he should feel lucky that he didn’t sustain any serious injuries. (Although he would rather have luck stay out of it completely, considering his past experiences with the concept.)

His eyebrows had never been a distinguishing character of his anyway. They had always been rather thin and fair, so his appearance didn’t suffer a terrible loss. It was still odd, rubbing his fingers over a place that was normally soft and fuzzy and finding smooth, albeit sore in a few spots, skin.

Gaara turned onto his side, closing his eyes and placing his hands under his cheek. At least during Chemistry that day, he had been allowed full reign of the equipment. Maybe this was a good thing after all; now that Iruka had seen first-hand how incompetent Lee was, Gaara would be allowed to take full control of their assignments again. Lee had been unusually quiet during the class, though he had a thick apologetic aura surrounding him. He had kept his apologies to himself, thankfully. Gaara had had his fill of them the day before, and he found Lee’s desire to atone for his mishap more exhausting than the actual experience itself.

The exhaustion from the previous day was still tugging at his eyelids, lulling him into unconscious. He was always tired, but today he felt especially more tired than usual despite the fact that the previous night hadn’t been any more sleepless than any night before it. It was difficult for him to sleep at home, where it was dark and silent. Sleeping on the roof, under the sky, came easily to him. It was especially easy to drift off that day, under the light breeze and the uncharacteristically blue sky.

He heard a noise, but noises were common and easy to ignore, so that’s what he did. Until the noise grew louder, and was accompanied by a nudge to his abdomen. He groaned, aggravated by the disturbance to his sleep, and curled in on himself, hiding his face in his arms. The nudging didn’t stop, and neither did the voice, which he soon realized was calling his name quite incessantly.

“Gaara? Gaara, are you sleeping? Haha, the answer to that is probably obvious, isn’t it? You look like you are unconscious, so it is likely that you are napping. But, napping outside unsheltered like this can be dangerous! Are you wearing sunscreen? Your skin is so fair, you must burn quite easily -- oh, maybe it would be best not to bring up burning. But I think -- are you listening? Gaara? Do you always growl in your sleep?”

Gaara was definitely awake now, and though his back was still to the owner of the voice, he knew who it was.

He craned his neck, squinting at his lab partner. “What are you doing here?”

Lee smiled brightly, almost blindingly, making Gaara squint his eyes further. “I came looking for you! I had seen you head in this direction before, so I knew that you spent your lunchtime around the athletics building. Considering how frail you look, I thought it was safe to assume you were not practicing inside of the building, and knowing how anti-social you are, I knew you would go somewhere secluded, where no one would bother you. The rooftop was a lucky guess! But also the most likely one.”

There luck was again, sticking its head where it didn’t belong.

At the frail comment, Gaara had sat up and crossed his arms over his chest, clutching his elbows and wishing that Lee would disappear. He was weak; so what? He was fragile and pathetic and he didn’t need anyone to point out what he was fully aware of.

His hand slipped into his pocket subconsciously, searching for his sand.

“Why were you sleeping up here, anyway? Like I said, it can be dangerous without proper protection from the sun.”

“I like it up here,” Gaara answered, more honestly than he would have if he wasn’t preoccupied with groping the fabric in his pocket. “I like to sleep up here. I don’t sleep a lot at home.” He frowned as his fingers clutched only fabric in the depths of his pocket. He heard Lee comment on his response, registered that he mentioned something about Gaara’s lack of sleep explaining the permanent dark circles around his eyes, but his attention went to searching the next pocket. It was also empty.

His eyes widened in panic as his search came up fruitless. He patted himself down, hoping to feel a bubble of sand and plastic beneath his shirt or tucked somewhere deeper in his pant leg.

“Gone...It’s gone...” His heart was racing and he was finding it hard to breath. No, no no, he lost it, it couldn’t have disappeared, where could it have gone, what happened to it, where --

“Did you lose something? I can help you find it, if you will allow me! Oh, by the way,” Lee’s arms extended towards Gaara, his hand clutching a small ziploc bag, “you were asleep on top of this! It is very peculiar, a bag of sand being on the roof...I wonder how it got here?”

“Don’t -- !” Gaara’s hand snapped forward, grabbing the sand from Lee and clutching it tightly against his chest, curling his lip. “Don’t go touching other peoples’ belongings without permission!”

Lee frowned at him, obviously confused. “Um, Gaara, is that -- is that bag of sand the object you had misplaced?”

Gaara didn’t reply, he only squeezed his eyes shut tightly. He was overreacting, he knew he was overreacting. Just breathe. Lee didn’t mean anything by it, it was just another foolish action of his.

“Is that object -- is it precious to you?”

Gaara opened his eyes, just enough to glare at Lee, making the answer obvious. He turned away as Lee’s expression changed, pulling his knees up to his chest and tucking his chin between them. He held the sand against his chest with one hand, stroking it occasionally.

“One thousand apologies!” Lee threw his hands against the ground, lowering his head and bowing deeply in front of Gaara. “I did not know, Gaara! I am so terribly sorry -- please forgive me!”

Gaara watched Lee bow and beg for forgiveness. His gaze swept over Lee’s back and down his bowl cut, flopping forward onto the ground in front of him. He took a few moments to consider, and gave Lee his answer.

“No.”

“I -- what?!”

His face was turned away so he couldn’t see Lee bolt upright with a tortured expression on his face. It was easy enough to imagine, however.

“But Gaara! I -- wait! Um, I have something for you…please accept this as an apology!”

Gaara looked back to see Lee holding something in front of him with both hands. It was rectangular and covered in a pale green cloth, knotted at the top. A suspicion formed in the back of his mind as to what was wrapped in that cloth, and Lee quickly confirmed that suspicion for him.

“It is a boxed lunch I have prepared for you! Coach Gai has taught me the best ingredients to use to make a midday meal fit to fully revitalize oneself. Please accept it as an apology and -- and also as a token of friendship!”

Lee looked up at him with wide eyes -- not that his eyes were ever anything but large, but now they seemed to engulf at least half of his entire face -- and Gaara wondered if he was on the brink of tears.

“I don’t want it.”

“Gaara, please! It is a token of _friendship_!”

“I don’t want to be your friend.”

“You don’t want to be my friend, yet.”

“I will never wish to be your friend. I don’t need a friend.”

“That is preposterous. Everybody needs friends!”

“Do you have any friends?”

“Of course I do! I am not such a complete outcast that I cannot even make one friend -- ”

Lee stopped speaking as Gaara glared at him.

“Um...I apologize, again. I really did not mean it like that...” Lee scratched the back of his head, thinking to himself for a moment. “I meant it though! I mean -- about us being friends!” He added, thrusting the boxed lunch forward again. “I would like to become closer to you. I would like to become closer than lab partners -- I would like to become good friends with you, Gaara!”

Gaara stared at him, his gaze scrutinizing. “You made this lunch for me? Because you want to be my friend?”

Lee thrust the boxed lunch forward once again. “Yes! Please accept my token of friendship, Gaara,” he said, looking more solemn than Gaara had ever seen him before.

Gaara examined Lee and the lunch he held in front of him. After several moments of contemplation, he took the lunch from Lee’s hands. Lee beamed, jumping where he sat.

“I am so happy you have accepted my token of friendship, Gaara!” Lee said, watching as he stood. “This is marvelous! I -- um, Gaara, what are -- oh -- ”

Gaara had stood up to walk to the edge of the roof. He stood there as Lee watched, giving him one last glare before tossing the lunch off of the rooftop. He turned away, not bothering to take in Lee’s expression or imagine what it would look like as he walked towards the exit and left the rooftop. He could find somewhere else to finish the rest of his lunch. And if Lee continued to show up here in the future, Gaara could find another place to spend his free time entirely.


End file.
